Blender cycles and blender internal look the same and my materials are too shiny even on diffuse
In your screenshots only the OpenGL viewport "preview" shading is being used; to see what your materials actually look like when rendered with BI or cycles, switch from Solid shading to Rendered in 3D view > Header (or press &#8679; ShiftZ)



You can adjust the way a cycles material is rendered in solid view via the options in Materials > Settings: